


Witches' Briar

by originally



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Bear Island, Community: got_exchange, Gen, Ghosts, Minor Alysane Mormont/OFC, Northern History & Lore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-24
Updated: 2016-09-24
Packaged: 2018-08-17 02:53:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8127596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/originally/pseuds/originally
Summary: The women of House Mormont have a duty to the land.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mautadite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mautadite/gifts).



> Originally posted at [got-exchange](http://got-exchange.livejournal.com/183746.html) round 15. Written for the prompt 'tell me a ghost story'.

The dawn stole across the landscape, its pale fingers creeping over tall soldier pines and purple hawthorns and the jagged, lichen-covered rocks that rimmed the shoreline. It glittered on the calm surface of the water, though it could not penetrate the thick sea-mist that obscured the view across the Bay of Ice to the mainland. Alysane planted her foot on a rock and leaned on her knee as she breathed deeply, the way she did every morning, taking in the fresh salt air and the scent of the witches’ briar newly in bloom. She watched as a bright-billed oystercatcher hopped hopefully along the sand and a group of seals lazed on the rocks, waiting for the tide to come back in and wash them back out to sea. Somewhere across the craggy bluffs that rose imposingly from the water, a gull cried out, obscured by the mist, mournful and piercing in the silence of the morning.  
  
The sturdy fishing cobles would be returning soon enough with the day’s catch stacked upon their wooden decks, huge cod and silvery herring glistening in the light, perhaps a few fat crabs that would do for dinner. Attacks by ironmen had long ago dwindled into nothing and they had lost fewer of their number to wildling raiders in recent times, both at sea and on the shore. As the summer grew longer, their granaries grew more robust, their fishing fleet more numerous, their fighting women fat and hardy, and their children hale and strong. Still, she she had a vigil she must hold here. Her mother had performed this duty once, and her mother before her. Alysane’s daughter would perform it too, once she had grown to womanhood. She strained her eyes to see beyond the dense, cloying mist and listened hard for any sound of boats cutting through the water.  
  
The voice drifted across the bay, almost too faint to hear. She might have taken it for another gull until the cry resolved into words. It was a woman’s voice, distressed and afraid. Alysane’s hand went to the hilt of her sword by instinct, though she stopped short of drawing it. The woman cried again for help and Alysane started forward, her boots finding purchase on the slick rocks through years of habit. She had a boat tied at the staith that jutted out into the sea not far from where she made her watch, and an islander’s skill at rowing it. As she mounted the wooden steps, however, the once-calm sea began to roil, as though a storm had crept upon her unawares, or else some unseen hand had stirred it into wrath. The wooden boards bowed and swayed beneath her feet and salt wind lashed her face as she hefted her oars and unhitched the rope from its post.  
  
The sudden wind had swept away the mist and now Alysane could see her clearly: a woman, dressed in the drab and patched clothing of a mainland peasant, her dark hair storm-whipped and wild, her expression terrified. She clung to a rocky outcrop in the bay, where white water churned and eddied; it was a span notoriously treacherous to navigate for those who did not know it well and the bones of many wrecks lay rotting beneath its surface.  
  
The waves buffeted Alysane’s boat this way and that. She held on grimly to her oars, using all her strength to hold fast against the gale and the current as she drew closer to the rocks. They sprang up from the water like a kraken’s razor teeth, ready to drag her down to the domain of whatever sodden god the ironmen worshipped. The woman was frantic now, calling to Alysane with words the wind snatched away before they could reach her ears. She gritted her teeth and held the boat as steady as she could, her shoulders screaming with the effort of it.  
  
“Jump,” she cried. “Jump! It’s the only way.”  
  
The woman met her gaze and for a moment Alysane felt caught, pinned to the spot by what she saw in those fathomless grey eyes. Then the woman hoisted her skirts and made a flying leap. Alysane grabbed wildly for her, pulling her over into the bottom of the boat where she lay, panting and shaking, as Alysane rowed urgently for the safety of Bear Island.  
  
When they reached shore, Alysane splashed out into the shallows to pull the boat up. Robbed of its prize, the sea seemed to have calmed and settled. No gale blew around them, nor waves crashed upon the shore. Once more, Alysane could smell the briar roses, sweet and fragrant and cloying. The woman tumbled over the side of the boat and stood shivering on shaky legs. She raised her eyes to Alysane’s.  
  
“Lady Mormont,” the woman said, and inclined her head. “You have my heartfelt thanks.” Though the wind no longer whipped her hair, it remained wild and tangled, dark against the pallor of her face. Up close, Alysane could see her style of dress was queer and old-fashioned and she wore many amulets about her neck, draped in layers that rang as she walked like bells. These were not the symbols of the seven or the modern, fashionable gods of the south; they marked her as a witch of the Wolfswood, a woman wise in the old ways. She reached out an ungloved hand to cup Alysane’s cheek with fingers cold as summer snow.  
  
This here was the duty. Her lady mother had told her the tale one night in her cups, before this endless summer had begun, though Alysane at first had thought it naught but talk. Once, back in the days before House Mormont had ruled Bear Island, Starks and ironmen had warred openly over these lands. The squids had taken northern women for their salt wives, dragging them indiscriminately from their homes. One day, they had made the wrong choice, had taken a woods witch as she gathered wildflowers for her poultices and draughts. A sudden storm had descended and their longship had run afoul of the rocks in the Bay of Ice; all lives were lost. It was said the witch had cursed the squid king to relive her death again and again, to never prosper on the lands from which they had taken her. Thereafter had the ironmen been driven out of the north in disgrace by King Rodrik Stark and the island given over to Alysane’s house, but the witch’s ire had played out its fearful scene year after year, whenever the roses bloomed upon the shore. So long as House Mormont treated her with kindness, they would flourish here.  
  
A lock of hair had shaken loose from Alysane’s braid and the witch brushed it from her face. Though the witch's skin was young and unlined, her eyes were ancient and infinite, abyssal, like the ocean whence she had come. There was beauty in her wildness, the kind that Alysane might find in the stark loveliness of the island or the raw power of a she-bear's fury. She could not say how long they stood there gazing upon one another before the witch pressed her freezing mouth to Alysane’s once lightly, in thanks, in blessing, and then was gone. No trace was left to mark where she had been bar the tingling in Alysane's lips.  
  
She stood and stared unseeing at the water until the sound of oars and men's shouts brought her to her senses. _Until next year_ , she thought, and turned away. The fishermen returned and there was yet work to do.


End file.
